Is Hollywood slowly turning pro-life?
I must be seeing things. No, it's true. In the past year I've seen more secular movies and TV shows address the issue, not in a militant Operation Rescue fashion, but in a very real sense of simply proposing, "I think having the baby is the right thing to do!"
The current issue of Christianity Today just chimed in on this fact in this article, proposing...
In some ways, 2007 was the Year of Pro-Life Cinema. From the church-friendly Bella to the raunchy Knocked Up, film after film depicted its main character facing an unplanned pregnancy and opting not for abortion, but for carrying the unborn child to term. Sometimes the mother kept the baby (Knocked Up, Waitress), and sometimes she gave the baby up for adoption (Bella, Juno, August Rush). But in each of these films, the mother, and sometimes the father, made a critical decision that was decidedly "pro-life."
And last weekend, NBC's Friday Night Lights delivered one of the most powerful pro-life speeches I've heard in recent years. Crippled quarterback Jason Street pleads with a "one night stand" to keep their child. He goes on to describe the baby growing in her, the little hands forming... a powerful talk.
The incredible thing about all of this attention on the issue is the fact that these aren't obscure little films. Juno is huge right now (it's made over 109 million) and a ton of our kids are seeing it. And sadly, a ton of our kids saw the very R-rated Knocked Up (really raunchy film, with a really cool theme). The value of the life of the unborn child is being placed on kids' minds, and this generation is always open to share their point of view on an issue.
If you're looking for discussion starters on the subject, a few weeks ago we wrote a free MOVIE CLIP DISCUSSION on our web site using a scene from Bella that's a great one to use.
This is a good time to have conversations with kids about the issue.
(thanks to my brotha Thom for the email and CT link)